


Angel in an Airplane

by iSaphura



Category: Supernatural
Genre: An OC - Freeform, Angel Wings, Fluff, Gen, not beta'd we die like winchesters, season 12
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-14 14:15:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28796742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iSaphura/pseuds/iSaphura
Summary: Flight was fundamental to an angel, being trapped on the ground was unnatural. Flying was part of their very being, their very essence, their very existence, and it had been taken from them.Cas mourns the loss of his wings, the brothers give him the next best thing.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	Angel in an Airplane

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, confession: I have not watched Supernatural since Season 10, I think, and I haven't written fanfic for it since longer than that, so you're going to have to be patient with me and fair warning the boys might be a little OOC. However, ever since the finale I've had ideas floating around in my head and I need them out and this one finally got put to paper. I don't know what I'm doing. I also couldn't come up with an actual ending so... yeah. It's okay.
> 
> R, this one's for you. You dragged me back in.

As he did most nights, Castiel was wandering the halls of the Bunker.

It had been two days since the encounter with Isham, two days since he learned the truth about that mission a century ago, two days since he learned of another mistake to add to his ever-growing list. The healing and subsequent fight had left Cas drained, so he returned to the Bunker with the Winchesters to recuperate before figuring out his next move. Sam and Dean were sleeping. Really, Castiel should have been sleeping too, but as tired and worn out as he was, he still found it difficult. Sleeping left him vulnerable in more ways than one. It left him open to ambush, and to nightmares. He wasn’t sure which was worse.

So he patrolled the halls. That was something he could do; it wasn’t necessary but he could do it. Such a large structure for only two humans and an angel. When the Winchesters first brought him here, it felt like a forgotten tomb, but little by little they had made it home.

Cas pushed a set of doors open. Moonlight filtered in through large panes of glass etched with sigils designed to increase the efficiency of the sunlight that passed through them. It was a creative feat of spell work, and allowed a number of plants to grow. When the Winchesters had first found the Bunker, everything was overgrown and dead; it had taken weeks to clear out all the old plant matter and clean. Cas smiled at the memory of the boys smearing each other with dirt before they turned on him and did the same. It had taken ages to get all of the soil out of his coat.

Once they cleared out the space, Sam had done his best to fill it. There were a number of rare plants as well as common ones used for spell craft. One section was dedicated to vegetables. Sam set up an irrigation system and composting. Cas made a point to imbue a little of his grace in the plants when he visited. All of the plants were thriving.

One of the walls was covered in mirrors in an effort to supplement the sunlight that came in. Cas caught his reflection: a dark haired man in a tan coat, not young but not yet middle-aged. Jimmy Novak, father, devout man, vessel. Jimmy was in heaven now, but Cas still saw him. This body, this face, would always be Jimmy’s to him. It would never be his. His true face was so different, his true self was so different: massive and incorporeal.

Cas faced the mirrors, took a deep breath, and closed his eyes. He loosened his grip on his vessel and felt the ghostly tug of his wings as they started to manifest in the physical plane. As far as he knew, no angel had ever fully manifested their wings, usually only a partial manifestation was enough to get their point across. Cas opened his eyes.

His wings extended behind him; shadowy, spindly echoes of what they were. What they once were, what he once was. He flapped them gently, stirring the otherwise still air and causing the leaves of nearby plants to rustle. He could just make out the shapes of pinfeathers; it would take years, centuries even, for his feathers to regrow. Until then, he was trapped on the ground.

To his dismay, a feather tumbled to the ground: a secondary covert that had been bothering him and threatening to fall out for weeks. It could have been worse, Cas supposed. He had lost two of his remaining primary flight feathers over the past few months. They were currently hidden away in a warded box in the back of the closet in his room. He couldn’t bring himself to destroy them, nor could he bring himself to offer them up to use as spell ingredients. If he did that, it would mean admitting his wings were broken, that he was broken, that his grace was…

“…Cas?”

Cas turned to the door. A sleepy Dean Winchester stood in the doorway, slightly slack-jawed. Cas quickly shifted his wings back to the celestial plane, wincing when he did it too quickly. “I thought you were asleep,” he said.

“I was,” Dean said. “Needed to leak, saw a light.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

The awkward silence that followed was so thick Cas could have cut it with his blade.

“I thought you got your mojo back?” Dean said.

“I… I did.” _Not all of it_ , Cas thought, but instead said. “Metatron’s spell broke the wings of all angels. Mine… while I was human they essentially atrophied. By time I regained my grace, the damage was done.”

There was more to it than that. Using stolen grace only exacerbated his wings’ decay, and being Lucifer’s vessel for several months hadn’t helped. The fallen angel was more than happy to use Castiel’s grace before his own, siphoning it away from healing his wings and budding pinfeathers. He had done other things to him as well, but those were barely worth remembering, let alone mentioning.

“I’m sorry.”

Castiel blinked. “What?”

“I’m sorry,” Dean said. “I can’t even imagine what it must be like.”

No, he really couldn’t. There was no human equivalent of losing the ability to fly. Losing the use of a set of limbs came close, but still paled in comparison. Cas reached down and picked up the now corporeal feather. No wonder it had fallen out: it was ragged and torn and missing veins, but what remained… was still beautiful. It was black, the color of the sky at midnight. The veins caught the light of the moon, creating iridescent rainbows along the length of the feather. His wings hadn’t always been like that. During the campaign to rescue Dean from Hell, his wings had lost their luster and gained this iridescence. Other angels had looked down and pitied the damage to his wings, but Cas had grown to like the new coloration. Somehow it was more… him.

Dean walked over and Cas handed the feather over. The eldest Winchester looked it over and asked quietly, “Do you miss it?”

“What?”

“Flying,” Den said. “Do you ever miss it?”

It took several seconds for Cas to dislodge the words in his throat and croak out, “Every day.”

It was like asking a fish if it missed the water, if a tiger missed its stripes. Of course his missed flying. He missed how it made travel so easy: no cars, no walking, no buses, just a thought and a flap of his wings and he was where he needed to be. All of Heaven and Earth, just a wing beat away. He missed it with every broken quill, every clear breeze that ruffled his hair, with every sunny day and every exhausting car ride.

It was more than that, of course. At times, he and his garrison were assigned to watch over the Earth. It was considered boring grunt work, better suited for lesser angels, but Cas learned to enjoy the reconnaissance flights. Flying above the Earth, held up by nothing but a pillow of gaseous molecules, watching the planet turn beneath him and the sun rise above the curved horizon. Soaring above mountains that scraped the sky, swooping low over the oceans and gazing into their even greater depths. And above all, observing his Father’s creations go about their lives, surviving and evolving and changing.

Flight was fundamental to an angel, being trapped on the ground was unnatural. Flying was part of their very being, their very essence, their very existence, and it had been taken from them. From all of them. Because of him.

“…Cas?”

Dean’s voice pulled Cas back into the real world. The angel realized his cheek was wet; damn the sprinkler system must be malfunctioning.

“Sorry, I don’t…” Cas brushed at the water droplets. “I’m sorry, Dean.”

“C’mon, man,” Dean said. “You know what always makes me feel better?”

“Dean, I don’t want alcohol.”

“That’s not… I wasn’t going to give that to you. I was thinking peanut butter and fluff…”

* * *

Another dead end. Castiel groaned and tossed the tome he had been going through into the pile of books that also had nothing to offer him. Tracking and locating Kelly Kline was proving to be like trying to find a needle in a haystack in the middle of a hurricane: impossible. Which was in and of itself impossible. She was a human woman, no special powers, no knowledge of the arcane or powerful allies to speak of, and she was carrying a _nephilim_. He should have been able to pick up and hone in on the nephilim’s energy signature but… that had proved useless. Along with every other idea he had come up with to find her.

As Dean would say, fuck.

“Oi, Cas!”

Cas lifted his head to find Dean standing in the door, car keys in hand. “What?”

“Field trip.”

“Field trip?”

“That’s what I said, grab your coat. Let’s go.”

“Dean…”

“Look man, you’ve been trying to find Kelly for days,” Dean said. “You need to take a break, and if we don’t go now we’ll miss the chance. Now c’mon!”

Cas stood up and grabbed his trench coat. “Where are we going?”

“Surprise.”

The angel paused. That… didn’t bode well. Dean Winchester’s surprises could range from enjoyable to… very much _not_ enjoyable. Cas shrugged and followed Dean up to the garage where Sam was waiting by the impala.

“Ready?” the younger Winchester asked.

“As I’ll ever be,” Dean replied as he climbed into the car.

Sam folded himself into the passenger seat while Cas ducked into the back. He had barely got situated when Dean tossed a bandanna at him and said, “Put that on.”

Cas frowned. “What? Why?”

“I told you, it’s a surprise,” Dean said. “We’re not leaving until you put that on.”

“Is this really necessary?”

“Yes,” the Winchester brothers said.

Cas carefully raised the bandanna to his eyes and secured it behind his head. He swallowed the brief twinge of panic; he’d been blindfolded enough to know it was usually a bad thing. Something that rendered him helpless. Mostly helpless.

“No peeking!” Dean said from in front of him.

The car ride was uneventful. Cas knew he could bypass the blindfold, extend his senses outward, but that would be _peeking_. At least his hands weren’t bound, he thought. This was Sam and Dean, he was fine. He was safe. After about half an hour, the car came to a stop.

“Can I take this off yet?” Cas asked.

“No,” Dean said. “Right, Sam, you go find… the person. I’ll get Cas in place.”

“Okay,” Sam said.

Dean helped Cas out of the car and started to lead him away. They were outside, somewhere with plenty of space and nothing to block the breeze. Cas could feel the sun on his skin. He could also hear things, mechanical things, engines that were louder than the impala’s. And a smell like gasoline, but sharper, drier, that he could almost taste.

“Stand right here,” Dean instructed. Before Cas could say anything, he was gone.

He very nearly ripped the blindfold off right then and there, surprise be damned. “Dean?”

“You can take it off now!”

Cas did so and blinked as his eyes adjusted to the light. Dean was gesturing in an exaggerated manor. “Dean, what is this?”

Dean rolled his eyes. “C’mon, Cas, you’ve seen an airplane before.”

He had. Dean was standing next to a small white and red airplane. It sat on three wheels, with a cockpit capable of carrying a pilot and a few passengers situated under its wings. There was a single propeller on its nose.

“So remember a while back? That night in the conservatory?” Dean said. “It got me thinking: we can’t fix your wings, but we can give you the next best thing.”

“An… airplane?”

“Sort of. We called in a few favors and found someone who was willing to take you up for a flight.”

“Hey there, gentlemen!”

Cas turned around as Sam and a woman walked up. Dean grinned and shook her hand. “Hey Mira, long time no see.”

Mira laughed. “Too long.” She turned to Cas. “You must be Castiel.”

“Erm, yes,” Cas said.

“Mira’s a hunter,” Sam explained. “Among other things.”

“Oh shut up.” Mira jabbed Sam in the side. “Unlike these two, I tend to fly to my job sites. So, you all going up with me?”

“Hell no,” Dean said a bit too quickly.

“I don’t think I’d fit,” Sam added.

“Eh, you’re probably right.” Mira grinned. “C’mon, Dean, you know you want to. It was your idea, after all.”

Dean blanched.

* * *

“Remember, Dean, if you have to hurl do it in the bag!”

“Shuddup.”

Dean was buckled into the back seat of the plane, his knuckles white from holding onto a plastic bag. As expected, the tiny plane was not built for a man of Sam’s stature, so the younger Winchester stayed behind. Cas was sitting up front with Mira. He had no idea what any of the knobs, switches, or gauges did or meant, but he was fascinated by them. Human ingenuity never ceased to amaze him.

“Here we go!” Mira said over the headset.

Dean yelped as the little plane lurched forward and started picking up speed. Faster and faster it sprinted down the runway until, much to Cas’s amazement, the runway started to pull away. For a moment his stomach dropped and it felt like gravity increased in order to try and drag him back groundward, but the sensation quickly passed and the little plane continued its upward climb.

He was flying. He was actually _flying_.

His wings twitched in the celestial plane, sending echoes into the physical plane and shaking the little airplane. Dean yelped.

“Just a bit of turbulence,” Mira said. “Nothing to worry about!”

Cas tucked his wings in tighter and looked out of the window.

The ground grew further and further away. Mira guided the plane into a wide left banking turn, giving Cas a view of the airport they had taken off from. He smiled as he spotted the shiny black shape of the impala. He could hear Mira talking, but he wasn’t paying attention. His attention was focused on the world below.

He spotted a few familiar landmarks: the town square ringed by the town hall, post office, a church, and the library. There was Dean’s favorite bar, and the diner Mary loved to go to, the health food store Sam frequented, and the park where Cas liked to people-watch. And there! He could just make out the fuzzy glow of the warding around the Bunker.

They flew higher and the landscape surrounding Lebanon, Kansas opened up even more before Castiel. There were miles of seemingly endless farm fields, squares of various shades of green and gold. He could make out the gray line of the interstate, and a cluster of buildings of the next town over. In the distance, he could make out the shining ribbon of a river.

Cas drew his gaze from the ground to the sky. To his delight, he spotted a flock of birds flying almost parallel with the plane. He watched as they beat their wings, creating lift and propelling themselves through the air. The plane flew through a few wispy low-lying clouds, little more than gossamer made of water droplets. Higher, much higher, scattered sheets of cirrus clouds floated through the impossibly blue sky. He wasn’t sure if he had ever seen a sky so blue.

It was all so beautiful. It was so peaceful from up in the sky, so simple.

Cas’s nose was glued to the window for the entire flight, and a smile fixed firmly on his face. Mira occasionally checked on Dean, who made a point to not look out the window. The flight was perfect, and over too soon. Cas’s heart sank as the plane circled back to the airport. He almost begged Mira to circle around again. The ground came close and closer until at last the tires touched down on the runway. The wayward angel had returned to Earth.

They had barely come to a stop when Dean all but fell out of the plane. “Oh thank god.”

“It wasn’t that bad!” Mira called out as she shut the engine down. She looked at Cas. “What did you think?”

What did he think? _What did he think_? Castiel thought a lot of things. He thought that it was amazing, beautiful, perfect, exquisite, a miracle. It wasn’t like flying himself, but it had come very, very close. It had given him back something he thought he'd lost forever. Dean had been right: he had needed this.

Cas smiled. “Thank you.”


End file.
